What the 2026 Trafficking in Persons Report means for country AML risk

The US State Department published its 2026 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report on 8 October. Covering the period 1 April 2025 to 31 March 2026. .

Scam operations and the proceeds

One of the four special-interest topics highlighted within the report is scam operations, describing how transnational criminal organisations are behind many of the scam operations. In Southeast Asia, most are  run by Chinese nationals, although they increasingly operate in other regions, recruiting hundreds of thousands of people from at least 80 countries. Victims in more than 125 countries have been defrauded through crypto investment scams, romance scams and illegal online gambling. Americans lost at least $18.2 billion to Southeast Asia-based operations in 2025.

On the money, the report says criminals use cryptocurrency to move proceeds with minimal traceability. It adds that many countries lack the laws and resources to regulate cryptocurrency or pursue cybercrime investigations.

The geography is widening. The report describes operations moving into residential areas and increasing in Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, the Pacific Islands, Europe and Latin America. In those locations, it says, they may use the same money laundering networks as cartels and other drug trafficking networks.

For a country risk assessment, that matters. A jurisdiction can acquire exposure to this typology without any change in its FATF status. The report also calls on governments to address corruption, complicity and high rates of impunity, all of which AML teams already assess in a country’s corruption profile.

What the tiers measure

The report says tiers reflect government efforts to meet the minimum standards of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act. They are a separate measure from the size of a country’s trafficking problem.

That affects how you read them. Tier 1 includes the UK, the US, Singapore, Germany and France. Switzerland and the UAE are Tier 2. Tier 3 includes Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela, Hong Kong S.A.R. and Macau S.A.R.

The report also identifies 12 governments with a policy or pattern of trafficking: Afghanistan, Belarus, Burma, Cambodia, China, Cuba, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Russia, South Sudan and Sudan. Nine of them have a named programme on OFAC’s list of sanctions programmes. Where the state itself is implicated, state-linked counterparties and source-of-funds explanations deserve closer scrutiny.

Eighteen countries sit on the Tier 2 Watch List, including Brazil, South Africa, Syria and Nepal. A country that stays on the Watch List for two consecutive years becomes Tier 3 automatically in the third year, with a single waiver available.

The enforcement data

Globally, 2025 compared with 2024:

• Prosecutions: 24,254 against 15,791 (up 53.6%)
• Convictions: 7,576 against 7,975 (down 5.0%)
• Victims identified: 156,912 against 102,027 (up 53.8%)
• New or amended legislation: 9 against 16

The report describes these as estimates derived from data provided by foreign governments and other sources. Prosecutions rose by half and convictions fell. Regionally, Near East prosecutions reached 6,568 from 1,743, and victims identified in Europe rose 91.4% to 36,109.

Using the report in your country risk assessment

Check that your methodology scores human trafficking as its own factor. Check that your crypto and payments monitoring covers scam-operation typologies, including customers connected to jurisdictions that were not on your radar a year ago. Review exposure to Tier 3 countries and the 12 state-implicated governments, and record your reasoning.

KnowYourCountry covers 245 jurisdictions. Our expanded methodology splits the criminality category into eight weighted sub-factors, and human trafficking is one of them. Scoring Profiles lets you weight each dimension to fit your business: a firm with a construction customer base can give human trafficking a higher weighting.

The TIP Report is a US government assessment, and its country findings reflect that government’s view. Read it as one source among several, and record how it informed your own. Our methodology has been trusted by regulated businesses and government agencies for over 20 years.